Behind the Veil

"My Bride, My Chosen One, I come for you. I long for you with a passion that far exceeds what you hope and long for. It grows each day, and I long to kiss you and to see your beautiful face.

Join me behind the veil. Trim the wick. Anoint your face and hands.

Draw near, Sweet One. Rest your head on My pillow. We are One, joined together in joy."

I received this love letter in November of 2000, during my prayer time. I recorded this letter right in the middle of the worst chaos of my life. It was a time of giant upheaval as tremors throughout the whole foundation of what I believed quaked and trembled. It seemed like the more Chaos launched persecution, marital abuse, and spiritual terrorism my way, the deeper the wooing of my Savior.

Nights were not kind to me. Vivid dreams woke me up several times a night, gasping for breath. I wrote the dreams down in my journals, just to "dump" them out of my head, and most of them seemed to be warning me of double-crosses, dangerous situations I needed to protect my children from, and more.

Two years later, all the dreams came to pass, in real life. In the midst of the chaos, the love letters only intensified. It seemed the more Chaos targeted me, the more love God sent, and the greater Love empowered me to escape to freedom.

I learned my greatest life lesson during that long time of deep travail. And that is: True Love Prevails. True love is known and experienced behind the veil.

The love letters kept me going, protected me, and pointed the way to freedom.

You and I are being called to meet with Him behind the veil. We desperately need this intimacy with God. I believe it's because she (we as Christians, Muslims, and many other religious people) are like an abused wife. Most of us don't even know it, yet. In our zeal to love and serve and do good things, we have been betrayed by the Evil One and have "married" ourselves to an evil system, a false "christ".

Remember the most potent version of Evil is what most people call "Good".

We've lived for so long within the confines of the religious system, that we've becoming conditioned to being told what to believe, how to live, and it's all tied to rule-keeping in one way or another. It doesn't matter if you are Pentecostal, a Charismatic, a Fundamentalist, a Catholic, or a Non-denominational… the religious system has set up concentration camps everywhere!

I believe God allowed me to experience the worst of the marriage and religious systems, both – so much so that my counselors called me "the most abused woman" they had met, for a reason. Personally, because I asked Him for the "hardest tests" and generally, because He might use me as a type of demonstration of the grace and mercy of God. I have no regrets, because the pain caused me to live behind the veil.

What does it mean, to meet Him "behind the veil?" Behind the veil is a reference to the temple in the Old Testament. Only the high priest was allowed to go behind the veil, and even then it was a risky deal. In order to qualify for the privilege, the high priest had to undergo purification rituals. One could never be quite sure if they were pure enough, so bells were tied to the priest's ankles to alert those outside the veil if something had gone wrong.If the priest was not pure in heart, he would die in God's presence (thus, the bells would no longer ring) and have to be dragged out.

Behind the veil is where God's presence is. Behind the veil is a place of deep intimacy – bridal intimacy.

One of the metaphors describing our relationship with God is that of a husband with His Bride. Paul, the writer of Ephesians and many other New Testament books, speaks of a "great mystery" – and he uses the imagery of sexual intimacy between man and wife to describe the intimacies we have between God and us!

To be a "bride" means that we become transformed at the core level of our being. All the "spots, stains, and wrinkles" are removed!

For me, that "core level" is the area of my self worth. Feeling unloved, unworthy, and not good enough are spots, stains, and wrinkles that create mental pathways for fears, insecurities, and abusive situations into my life… which create cycles that create more havoc to my soul.

Transformation begins with the renewing of our minds. Salvation is not a prayer you pray to get an entrance ticket to Heaven. Salvation is a lifestyle of transformation. We go from "glory to glory".

It's like climbing a mountain. We reach peaks, and then pretty soon there's another peak to challenge ourselves to climb! It's never boring in the Kingdom of God 🙂

Many of us have felt a desire, a calling, to earthly ministry. We want to be on stage, with a microphone, and to feel God's Holy Spirit move powerfully through us to preach and teach, to heal the sick, and to set captives free. That's a good thing. The pursuit of excellence in the marketplace, church, the arts, medicine, media.. it's all good! We need your gifts. We need your voice. We need your presence in all of the earthly systems!

But there's an even better thing. It's the call to Bridal Intimacy, behind the veil. Many of us, in the past few years, have laid down our gifts, our ministries – everything – to enter behind the veil. I'm not saying that's what it takes, just that for many of us it's been a season of becoming quiet, even to the point of wondering if there will ever be "public ministry" for us again!

Behind the veil lie dreams, visions, revelations, and the power for supernatural living. It's an exciting lifestyle – the very lifestyle that Jesus modeled for us while here on earth. It's a lifestyle his disciples envied so much so that they begged Him to teach them how to pray. These were men who had grown up in the synagogue – they were familiar with prayer and worship – but they saw something more exciting and they wanted it!

Bridal Intimacy, going behind the veil, is a lifestyle of praying and living from the core of your being. It's being willing to be transformed from that core level, to be made "pure in heart".

It's an adventure in faith. All it requires is an attitude of "whatever it takes, change me".

For those of us who have had the "misfortune" of living with sociopaths, this is our finest hour… the hour of paybacks! Gifts of brokenness and redemption! The sociopaths were in our lives to reveal to us the depth of our own core-level spots, stains, and wrinkles.

The sociopaths revealed every dark place hidden in our own hearts.

Oh, don't you see how blessed we are!!!

To suffer is not a sin.

It's not a shame to have married and divorced a sociopath.

It's a blessing to have escaped the sociopath. It was the right thing to do.

But it was also a gift to be thankful for – a shortcut, if you will, to the deepest level of grace and mercy.

With all my love,

Sue

For more articles describing "bridal intimacy" and the power of true love, you may be interested in "Bridal Love" in which I recorded a video of a dream I received, portraying the Bride as Jesus sees her, so much different than the way the church describes her. You be the judge – I'm very interested to hear what YOU are thinking! Feel free to share in the comment box below!

Susan Schiller knows how it feels to lose everything: marriage and family, church and reputation, finances and businesses, and more. Susan's upcoming, interactive memoir, "On the Way Home," tells the story of how she came to be known as "the most abused woman" her counselors had yet met and how she learned to navigate her way out of hell to a rich and satisfying life. In her lifetime, Susan has served in duties ranging from home school mom – to pastor – to full-time deliverance minister – and to Midwest regional prayer coordinator for a large international ministry. These days you can usually find Susan soaking in her favorite hot springs pool, reading a book (or several), blogging, baking bread, or hanging out with her family and friends. You can get a free copy of Susan's upcoming book, "On the Way Home" by registering here.

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